


i don't miss you (but i guess i do wish you were still around)

by yzsho



Category: Figure Skating RPF
Genre: Friends to Enemies, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, hate sex if u squint, i guess, i've never written anything like this before rip, uuuh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-01
Updated: 2018-08-01
Packaged: 2019-06-19 21:27:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15518940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yzsho/pseuds/yzsho
Summary: It's strange, how you can miss something you hate.





	i don't miss you (but i guess i do wish you were still around)

It’s strange, how you can miss something you hate.

How even now, even through the smoke of a friendship that had gone down in flames, through the rubble of arguments and spit out insults fired so carelessly, sometimes their eyes still catch your gaze. Sometimes that fighting spirit that lingers in their eyes makes your heart jump, gives you that extra drive to do better, somehow makes you feel more  _ alive _ with every carefully choreographed movement and victorious smile.

Because they know they’ve beaten you.

They know you can’t do better than this.

And Shoma knows this feeling all too well; is well-acquainted with the phrase _almost,_ _not enough._ Despite years of training apathy he can’t help the bitter taste in his mouth as he smiles and holds another silver medal to his chest.

Despite it all, it’s always Yuzu.

Always Yuzu who’s the one Shoma ends up second to, always Yuzu who can’t help being this extraordinary. Because when he sets another world record, when he lands a jump thought to be impossible, Shoma’s always the one left as the follow-up. The successor to the throne that Yuzu just can’t seem to step down from.

Shoma hates it, and Yuzu knows this. It’s the reason they’ve stopped talking about eachother in interviews, the reason their public interactions have slowly withered into a whisper of what once upon a time would have been called friendship, the reason Shoma had run into Yuzu’s hotel room two years ago crying about how he just  _ couldn’t take it anymore. _

Over the years, they’d drifted. Still friends, maybe- but that evening two years ago had finally shattered the cracked foundations of whatever remained between them. It had ended with Yuzu, finally at his boiling point, bursting out saying that if Shoma hated it so much,  _ why didn’t he just leave him alone. _

Yuzu had left after that, silent. He hadn’t looked back.

And neither did Shoma. Even with their friendship slowly dying out, the media had certainly noticed that their interactions had been reduced down to stiff handshakes on the podium. They never asked questions outright, of course, but whenever someone asks  _ do you think you’ll ever overcome Hanyu, do you think 2022 is his,  _ there’s always something lingering underneath, something that wants more than a tight-lipped smile and  _ I guess we’ll just have to wait and see. _

Shoma won’t give them that, won’t let them see the hate boiling beneath the surface. Because  _ oh, _ does he hate him, hates that even with nothing left between them everything Shoma does is echoed back to him with  _ Yuzu Yuzu Yuzu.  _ How will Yuzu react to this. How will he fight back. How will he beat the horrible,  _ cheating _ Shoma Uno and reclaim the crown he hadn’t even lost in the first place.

Maybe that’s not Yuzu’s fault, just the media being their usual selves and bringing everything back to the one that will actually get them attention. But Yuzu’s the one who keeps them going, who smiles and says  _ noone poses a threat to me right now.  _ They never call him obnoxious, full of himself, because he’s right. Nathan with all his quads can only beat Yuzu on a bad day. Despite Yuzu’s 5th place standing during Worlds 2017, he’d still risen to the top while Shoma had taken second with a fall and just a few points between them.

Shoma could only dream of it.

In 2018 he’d only made it on the podium because of other’s failures. During the Olympics he’d still fallen, taking silver with a score that the judges had been easy on. He knows who really deserved the silver.

Shoma remembers still, the days after worlds in 2017, where Yuzu had admitted to him in a hushed voice over the film they’d been watching that he’d been  _ scared.  _ Scared that Shoma would beat him, scared that if he got another silver this would be the end of his career. Back then, Shoma had laughed nervously, flattered that his idol really thought that much of him.

Now Shoma’s just bitter, knowing that Yuzu had lied to him so effortlessly. As if Shoma could even come close to Yuzu, could be anything more than just a dim spark to Yuzu’s blazing fire. And the way his eyes had mirrored that flame as he spoke, the film completely forgotten as Shoma let himself get caught up in those dark eyes, the soft-spoken confession that had slipped from Yuzu’s lips so quietly.

Shoma still has to drag himself out of that memory, fight off the enchanting haze of that memory and try to rid himself of the blush creeping across his cheeks. He rolls over in the bed, glancing at the wall before him rather than the mess of black hair framing a too-perfect face, sunlight just barely brushing against the other’s features.

Perhaps what Shoma hates most about this is that he still  _ knows _ Yuzu, but only as a shell of what once was.

His hands always find every curve, every spot that makes Yuzu gasp and bunch up the sheets in his hands, but never the spots that Shoma knows should make Yuzu laugh because he’s always been ticklish. He knows how Yuzu sounds when he’s desperate, could replay the needy, gasped-out praise in his mind all day, but hasn’t seen a hint of content, no smile on his face when all’s said and done and there’s no words left to be exchanged.

And looking at Yuzu’s face now, eyelashes fluttering lightly as he lets out a disgruntled sound and pulls the sheets up to his bare chest, it hits him.

He’s never seen Yuzu truly  _ vulnerable  _ before.

That’s what makes Shoma pause in the middle of leaving, and, for the first time, look back at what he’s been missing.

**Author's Note:**

> inspired by this, uwu https://asoftersea.tumblr.com/post/172286083172/110-i-dont-miss-you-but-i-guess-i-do-wish-you
> 
> the ending was so bad ahhdifhhsdjisdh im so sorry what are words


End file.
